


matchbox

by yutashi (yutamon)



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Jeno plays with matches, M/M, Minor Violence, doll!renjun, gets creepy...
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-11
Updated: 2018-07-11
Packaged: 2019-06-09 00:41:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15255612
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yutamon/pseuds/yutashi
Summary: Renjun always said,"Little Jeno please don't play with matches."And Jeno always smiled and hid the matchbox behind his back."It's okay Renjunnie! I won't get hurt!"





	matchbox

**Author's Note:**

> Inspired by the game Love You to Bits and the song "Love4Eva" by LOONA.

_Renjun always said,_

_"Little Jeno please don't play with matches."_

_And Jeno always smiled and hid the matchbox behind his back._

_"It's okay Renjunnie! I won't get hurt!"_

_"Little Jeno..."_

_"I'm not little anymore Renjun, I'm a man now!"_

_"Yes I know... Uhm..."_

_"Call me just Jeno okay?"_

_"Yes Jeno..."_

_Renjun couldn't feel but when Jeno held his cold hands he was sure that he could feel the warmness._

 

Renjun had a bad sense of opportunity.

He heard shouts.

"JENO, I KNOW YOU CAN DO BETTER THAN THIS! AN EIGHTY IN MATHS IS FAR FROM GREAT! YOU DON'T EVEN STUDY, YOU ARE JUST AROUND THAT STUPID DOLL!"

"RENJUN IS MORE THAN THAT AND HE HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH MY GRADES!"

A slap resonated through the Victorian styled living room.

"DON'T YOU DARE TALK BACK TO ME! CURSED THE TIME WHEN I BOUGHT THAT STUPID DOLL HE DOES NOTHING BUT FOLLOW YOU AROUND! GO TO YOUR ROOM RIGHT NOW!"

Jeno ran through the doors with tears in his eyes.

He bumped into Renjun.

He could be slapped countless time, he could be yelled every day, but never once would he blame Renjun, his precious Renjun.

So Jeno grabbed his always cold hand and ran.

To nowhere really, just out of that prison he called home.

 

Jeno hated his father.

So he never let Renjun's hand go.

Never.

So when he left for school he would ask for Renjun to hide in the attic. He always felt bad for leaving tiny Renjun in the attic like an abandoned toy but Renjun would always smile and tell Jeno he would be fine.

"If Jeno comes back to me I will always be fine!"

And Jeno would blush, not really sure what to do with himself.

But this time he knew exactly what to do, he saw it in a movie.

He stood up really fast, turned the attic lights off, felt around and sat right in front of Renjun again. Grabbed his matchbox, reassured Renjun everything would be okay with a small giggle,

Lit a match,

Watched it burn in Renjun's eyes,

And when he knew Renjun was looking at him and only him under that small light,

He kissed him on his cold lips.

The match gave its last spark before dying down, but little did they know a whole other flame ignited in them.

 

_"YOU CAN'T KEEP DRAGGING THAT DOLL EVERYWHERE YOU GO JENO!"_

_"Jeno you never come out with us, what do you even do with that doll? It's kind of creepy..."_

_"I thought oppa liked me back... I guess that doll is more important than me, what a shame..."_

Jeno always apologized with that same fake smile, so so fake that it made his teeth hurt.

"Don't smile like that Jeno, that's not the Jeno I know..." Renjun would say.

And Jeno couldn't help but remove the mask when he was with Renjun, when he was in his arm, when his hair was being played with and when he could hear the accelerated pumps of Renjun's mechanical heart.

 

_"THE NEWEST SENSATION IN THE MARKET!! THESE NEW DOLLS HAVE A BEATING HEART!! WATCH THEM LEARN WITH YOU, STEP BY STEP, A LIFETIME PARTNER!! NOW IN STORES WITH CUSTOMIZABLE BODIES!!”_

_"Daddy, daddy I want a doll, can I please have a doll?_

_"I don't know Jeno, it's a very big responsibility..."_

_"Please daddy, I'll take really good care of Renjun, like a little brother since mommy said I can't have a real one!"_

_"You already named them?"_

_"Yes daddy, isn't Renjun such a pretty name?"_

_"Yes it is son... Yes it is..."_

 

"I love you Renjun..."

"You know I can't feel love Jeno..."

Jeno reached for his cold hand and placed it in his chest, right above his heart

"Here, can you feel it bursting through my chest? It burns brighter than any match, it sparkles more than all the stars in the sky, and it’s as everlasting as time itself. And it's all for you..."

"When did you become such a gentleman Jeno?" Renjun giggled to hide how his body temperature rose.

"When you decided to steal my heart..."

"Shut up..."

"Make me."

And they kissed in that garden full of roses and thorns.

Not knowing they were being observed.

 

Jeno felt it in his guts.

He chewed on his pen until he broke it and made his mouth bleed.

Blood never tasted so bitter.

Time never ticked so slowly.

 

Jeno ran home.

His lungs burned and his throat felt raw and bloody.

But he knew he had to run until his legs gave up, until he finally reached Renjun.

 

Renjun was not in the attic.

 

"Jeno, mother wants to talk to you, will you-"

"Where is Renjun?"

"Jeno... Let me explain..."

Jeno ignored his mother. Anger and fear consumed him.

 

He bursted into the living room and he could immediately feel two butlers coming closer to him.

His dad was sitting on his big armchair, with Renjun on his lap.

He had a screwdriver in his hand and Jeno could see cables coming out of the neck juncture.

His blood was boiling.

_"Daddy can you wake Renjun up today?" Little Jeno was so impatient to have Renjun by his side._

_"Yes I can, can you just fetch me a screwdriver? I need to open the lid on his neck."_

_"Will it h-hurt him?"_

_"No Jeno, but I need to do it to wake him up..."_

 

"FATHER STAY AWAY FROM HIM!"

"Jeno it's enough, you are completely OBCESSED WITH THIS BLOODY DOLL!"

"YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND!!"

By now Jeno was being held by the arms, he couldn't reach Renjun, he couldn't reach for his cold hand that he saw twitching every time his dad moved the cables and tubes, Renjun's _veins_.

"It s o-ok ay Je je Je n-no. ." Renjun's face was losing all the light, all the spark, but he tried his best to smile for Jeno, his Jeno.

"I WILL KILL YOU, LET HIM GO!!"

"THIS IS FOR YOUR OWN GOOD!"

Jeno was wild, his eyes glowed red, his knuckles turned white, his body was violently shaking.

He tried to reach the armchair, he tried and tried to release himself but to no avail.

His father kept struggling to deactivate Renjun.

Jeno kept screaming.

His father kept glancing at him, nervous that he couldn't get it done.

Jeno punched one of the butlers in the face and kicked the other in the shin.

"Don't get closer Jeno."

By now his father was standing, holding Renjun's lifeless body by the shoulders.

"You never understood, you never did..."

Jeno walked closer, like a wild animal ready to pounce his prey.

He saw the fear in his father’s eyes but also the anger and the desperation.

Jeno felt blood pumping right into his eardrums when he saw his dad grabbing Renjun's neck and firmly stilling his shoulder.

 

_"Daddy you're so strong! You can even lift mommy up! What about me, can you lift me up?"_

_"Of course I can, I will lift you so high that you'll be able to touch the stars."_

_"When I grow up I wanna be as strong as daddy so I can also lift Renjun up!"_

 

Jeno saw red.

Jeno cried.

Jeno felt like he was being stabbed.

His father.

As easy as you break a twig.

Broke Renjun's neck, ripping it right by the shoulder.

Jeno lost it.

He screamed in horror, he couldn't hear himself anymore.

And when his dad threw the dismantled body right out the window,

Right into the garden of roses,

He saw black.

 

Jeno woke up with a hole in his heart.

The house was empty.

He only stopped in the garden, right in front of the red roses.

He saw an arm,

He saw a torso,

He saw a head.

"It's okay Renjun, I love you to bits..."

 

Jeno took months, but he learned how to put Renjun together in that dark attic, that he locked every time he left the house.

His dad would talk to him but he never found a response.

Maybe Jeno broke too.

 

"Jeno, I'm back..." And Renjun could only throw himself into Jeno’s arms.

And at that moment Jeno knew that Renjun also put him together, every single time.

 

"Jeno I told you not to play with matches..."

Jeno smiled.

"Yes I know! But don't worry, I'll never be the one that will get burned..."

And Renjun watched how the flames reflected in Jeno's eyes in that dark dark attic.

 

"Renjun, I want to study abroad... You will come with me right?"

"Jeno, you know I'm an old model..." He giggled sweetly when Jeno rubbed his belly.

"But you're the only model compatible with my system!"

"Jeno... I think you broke me... Because I think I feel what you call love..."

_Renjun always said he hated when Jeno wore that mask._

_Rejun also said that he hated when Jeno played with matches._

_But Jeno promised that the mask would always come off._

_Jeno also promised that he would never get burned._

 

_6 am._

A strong fog surrounded the mansion.

Jeno had just finished the last gallon of gasoline.

"Hey Renjun do you know why I love matches so much?"

"No... Jeno why are we-"

"Shhh... I love matches cause they spark, they spark so bright, and it's just enough to create something even bigger... An even bigger flame, an even bigger fire..."

"Sometimes you just gotta burn all the bridges to finally be free and see everything fall into ashes..."

 

He lit up his last match.

Renjun saw the spark and heard the sizzle.

 

And he saw how Jeno threw it right into the opened mansion door,

Where it touched the track of gasoline.

And irrupted into horrid flames.

 

 Jeno turned around and greeted Renjun with a dazzling smile, eyes forming a crescent shape.

"Do you think I'm insane Renjun?"

"If you are insane Jeno then I am too,

Because after all I'm a doll that learned how to love,

And if loving is insane,

Then I'll gladly be insane with you."

 

Jeno smiled, the purest smile in the world and Renjun was quick to hold his warm hand and walk away with him, through that path decorated by beautiful blood roses where they once kissed, where once Jeno collected all the pieces of his beloved Renjun and now where Jeno discarded his matchbox.

 

"I love you Renjun."

"I love you too Jeno."

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> a special thanks to agu and mari for helping me tag!  
> "it’s the gothic noren fic we all deserved" - kayla, 2018


End file.
